Family of missing Wyoming mom, 33, says she sent 'scared and panicked texts' before vanishing during cross country trip from Alabama to Wyoming with her ex-boyfriend

The family of a missing Wyoming mom has said she sent scared and panicked texts before vanishing during a cross country trip with her ex-boyfriend. 

Kathryn 'Katie' Ferguson, 33, left her home state for Alabama earlier this year with her two daughters to live with her biological mom and escape from her ex, Adam Aviles Jr, according to her relatives. 

However, in October, Ferguson asked Aviles, 26, to come get her, and they started traveling home together. But only three made it.

Now, Ferguson's stepmom Angela has shown Fox News a series of frantic messages she sent her in the months and weeks before her disappearance. 

They show that Ferguson believed she was being followed by Aviles at times, and that she was 'scared' to go outside with her daughters, aged four and 11 months.   

During the road trip, Ferguson wrote to Angela: 'I don't want to be stranded on the side of the road with two kids.

'I know you're probably thinking, well you should have thought about it and planned about it, but Adam kept following us.

'I kept seeing him everywhere. I couldn't stay in Cody (city in Wyoming) … I'm not asking for a lot. I just need help.'

For the next few months, Ferguson stayed with her biological mom until they appeared to have a disagreement, and she vowed to move back to Cody. 

She asked Angela if she could book her a cheap hotel while en route back to the city.

'September 25 she was asking for money and was asking for us to put her up in a hotel... she was really just reaching out to us,' Angela told Fox, adding that she booked her a room. 

Ferguson's texts to Angela show she thanked her for the booking and added: 'We didn't know what we're going to do, and we're almost out of gas. 

'We are so exhausted. We just want to get as far away from him as we can because we're tired of looking over (our) shoulders constantly or scared to take the girls anywhere.'

During the same exchange, Katie said Aviles was using drugs again. It appears that she called him to pick them up and take them back to Cody. 

Her sister, Nicole, told Fox she was 'always so loving' and the last time they spoke in September she 'seemed fine'.  

'She said I love you and I said I love you too and that's the last time we spoke,' she said. 

But she claimed Aviles has a dark history of 'mental abuse' against her sister, and he would question her whenever she wanted to leave the house.  

'He was very very protective over her and would not let her do much to be honest,' Nicole said. 

'He was very possessive and very controlling about a lot of things she did especially towards the end.' 

'What I think happened after talking to the investigator - I know they can't tell me everything - but I think that he snapped,' Nicole said. 

'In my heart, I know she's not alive anymore. I don't need any kind of proof from anybody because I know that if she was here she would have got ahold of one of us. 

'Katie doesn't hide out, she's not that type of person.'

'I'm hoping if that is the case that she died instantly and didn't suffer,' she added.

Federal court documents reveal that Ferguson left Alabama in early October with Aviles and her two daughters, aged four and 11 months. She was last seen in Arkansas on October 5. 

But, four days later, on October 9, when Aviles was pulled over by Texas State Patrol officers noted a 'projectile hole' on the passenger side of the vehicle and no sign of Ferguson.

Aviles was pulled over again in Colorado and was the only adult in the car, the federal complaint alleges.

Aviles reportedly returned to Wyoming, with Ferguson's children but still no sign of their mother.

On November 4, his car, a 1999 Dodge Durango, was later found in Oregon Basin area near Cody, Wyoming. That was two days after police started to look for Ferguson and she was reported missing.

When members of the Park County Sheriff's Office found the vehicle, Sheriff Darrell Steward said he could smell 'putrefied blood' coming from the vehicle, according to the Cowboy State Daily.

The front passenger seat was missing and multiple Clorox wipes were found inside the vehicle. Police also found a loaded Glock pistol inside the vehicle. DNA tests from the scene have yet to be identified, according to the report.

A search warrant was executed by federal agents two days after his vehicle was located.

On November 8, police spoke to Aviles and he reportedly told officers that Katie 'was not missing, but she just does not want contact with her mother,' court documents allege.

One of the children did make statements about the father accidentally hurting her mother, the Cowboy State Daily noted.

Aviles was convicted of heroin possession in 2017 and was charged recently with having the firearm ammunition.

But, police have not yet charged him in connection to Ferguson's disappearance.

The missing woman's mother, Angela Ferguson, told a local news outlet KTVQ News that 'it all points in a very tragic direction, and so it's hard.'

'It's hard to hear the rumors, to hear what might have happened to her. It's just unfathomable, she added. 'It's devastating. It's the most tragic, awful thing.'

The family continues to wait to hear from investigators about potential DNA on clothing and other items investigators found in the truck.

Aviles is being held in a jail in Casper, Wyoming on federal charges that he has plead not guilty. A trial date has been set for January 24.

Aviles's lawyer, David Weiss, did not immediately return DailyMail.com's request for comment.